Very surprised at some of these. Umbreon at 22 (higher than Togekiss!) is kind of disgusting, and Hitmontop / Claydol are also way higher than they should be. Arcanine above Darm is pretty surprising too, although I would wager a large number of those are defensive (something Darm can't do). Unsurprised at the top 5, though - these are all fantastic Pokemon. Surprised that Kingdra has fallen so low. I suppose I haven't been using my Kingdra team at all, maybe now is a good time to start again.

Nidoking is accruing so much usage. He can damn near invalidate a bulky offensive team with his standard set alone. I keep telling myself to always keep him in the pocket on a serious team, but I haven't made any serious teams at all lately. Mew and Raikou sit at #8 and #9 rightfully because they destroy teams. I'm hoping one of them can trend into the Top 5, but as Flare said, every one of them is good enough to be there, except for Flygon IMO. Ideally, I'd like to see him at a more realistic number, like #12. But as long as people are winning with him, I don't think he's going anywhere for a while.

Arcanine at Top 10 is laughable. Not in any way a top-level UU Pokemon.

Top being used so much doesn't surprise me on its own - its one of two viable spinners in this tier (Claydol doesn't count). People using him more than Blastoise is very surprising though. Blastoise is pretty meh outside of being able to spin himself but he does serve as a pretty solid check to a lot of threatening mons, including the the most prolific spinblocker in the tier.

UU Leader

The thing is that of you use Blastoise as your spinner you're pretty much committing yourself to having it be your designated bulky water. This leaves you unable to pick one of the better ones without stacking up on weaknesses.

The thing about Blastoise is that using it kind of forces you into a relatively balanced team, or I guess stall if you're going to lean that way. I've yet to see a single offensive Blastoise actually achieve something because there are just better offensive water types in UU (KINGDRA) right now that mean you're only running it for spin, and if you're only running it to spin you want to make damn sure you get that spin off, and that means you want a bulky Blastiose that's going to take the punishment it has to to find time to spin. Hitmontop can at least mess around with a Technician set and still spin if it wants to (although UH 4MSS) since being a "revenge killer" means it's not expected to take the same punishment.

Personally I just really dislike all the spinners in UU so I either run Xatu which is rare or avoid anything that really doesn't like hazards. It's nice playing an offensive team because it's a lot harder to set Spikes vs a sweeper. As long as you play smart with any Scarfers you'll usually find you aren't facing too many hazards.

Ambipom at #4 in lead usage is a joke, when are people going to start realising that a Pokemon who can't do anything to basically any defensive Pokemon and has an extremely predictable move as it's sole niche is a poor way to get earlygame momentum. UU has plenty of Pokemon that get priority and then can actually do something else alongside having priority (Honchkrow, SD Mew, Bisharp, Technitop to an extent, Azumarill, Weavile to name a few) while Ambipom just sits there being a normal type with few good coverage options and gets things set up all over it. IDK if people who use turn one fast U-turn aren't intelligent enough to realise that you can just switch and you don't have to take the Fake Out just so you can U-turn... That's the only reason I'd think people would keep using this thing.

Umbreon higher than Shaymin and Togekiss is a joke, both of those are horrible Pokemon to face because of the hax they can inflict on you and yet a Pokemon who is literally never useful outside of heavy stall where the fact that it's setup bait for pretty much every sweeper in UU doesn't matter too much. It beats Mismagius I guess, trying to think of another Pokemon it isn't setup bait for... Rotom-N I guess but Trollfreak and I are the only people that used it this round even though it's great, apart from that even Payback weak sweepers like Mew can beat it because Umbreon's Payback is just that weak. Shaymin on the other hand basically rapes a defensive team every time it comes in with free 100% recovery and hax Flare meaning it has no solid defensive checks, the only thing that's going to beat it defensively is smart switching to drain Seed Flare PP. Togekiss is kind of similar in that it can heal off anything stall tries to do easily and even the best defensive answers can be beaten with enough flinches. Why aren't these Pokemon more popular...

Want a spinner? use hitmonlee, seriously this thing has ludicrous power and works despicably well with chandelure, hitmonlee removes snorlax and P-2, resists U-turn and can spin away the rocks that plague chandy, give it a go, i'm yet to be disappointed by him.

Eh, Hitmonlee isn't bad but he still suffers from If-I-didn't-have-Rapid-Spin-you-wouldn't-be-using-me-itis. Heracross has dual STABs that let it beat considerably more Pokemon, Medicham has a stronger HJK and a better movepool as well as the typing to actually switch into things, Machamp is infinitely better at being a bulky fighting-type and annoying piece of crap, Hitmontop is better at priority and still gets Rapid Spin and Gallade is better at the whole fighting-type with great SpDef role. Hitmonlee's only niche is combining things all of these have, which isn't bad but puts too much emphasis on his ability to rapid spin; I wouldn't use him if he couldn't. Not being able to hit any ghost that isn't Chandelure is a pain too though a lot of Spinners have this issue in UU because OU takes all the good ones.

Some of the standard sets are wasteful with their EV distribution. Such as Azumarill with 252 HP, when 232 HP/12 Def/12 SDef gives more defenses on both sides. Or, though it's not standard, the Choice Specs Lanturn set on the analysis page.

The thing is that of you use Blastoise as your spinner you're pretty much committing yourself to having it be your designated bulky water. This leaves you unable to pick one of the better ones without stacking up on weaknesses

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I don't know. Doubling up on bulky Waters isn't a bad idea, what with the strong Fire types in the tier. Darmanitan, Victini, and Chandelure are easily the most threatening non-set-up Pokemon at the moment, and on some teams Rhyperior + Water or Snorlax + Water just doesn't seem to work out, while a Rapid Spinner does, so Blastoise goes on in addition to the other Water. I'd assume it's a response to the double Fire you find on some offensive teams.

Eh, Hitmonlee isn't bad but he still suffers from If-I-didn't-have-Rapid-Spin-you-wouldn't-be-using-me-itis. Heracross has dual STABs that let it beat considerably more Pokemon, Medicham has a stronger HJK and a better movepool as well as the typing to actually switch into things, Machamp is infinitely better at being a bulky fighting-type and annoying piece of crap, Hitmontop is better at priority and still gets Rapid Spin and Gallade is better at the whole fighting-type with great SpDef role. Hitmonlee's only niche is combining things all of these have, which isn't bad but puts too much emphasis on his ability to rapid spin; I wouldn't use him if he couldn't. Not being able to hit any ghost that isn't Chandelure is a pain too though a lot of Spinners have this issue in UU because OU takes all the good ones.

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Hitmonlee is not good as a spinner because he struggles with bulky ghost pokemon, and the fact that even if it didn't get Rapid Spin, ghost types would still be its #1 switch in (something you can't say about Blastoise ie). In fact, most of the people who run Hitmonlee aren't using it because it can Rapid Spin, but because of the Unburden thing, it just works on a different way, you can't compare it to Heracross.

This is a travesty. I would almost say that this thing is as good, if not better, at sweeping lategame than Sharpedo. It absolutely rolls through teams if you give it hazard support and/or pair it with a pursuit user. I am of course speaking about Unburden Lee and not the shitty Rapid Spin set, which I hope to god no one uses.

Yeah, much as I love ambi, we should really just let him fall to RU. We seriously need to get new stuff down there. Higher than krook and cro is admitedly shameful.

Speaking of crobat, it is a ridiculously good stall breaker. So few defensive cores will have an answer to it and it's great at picking of weakened or frail offensive pokemon too. Really needs more love

Honestly, I like Arcanine offensivly much better than Darm for a couple reasons. One is Flash Fire. Darm has a hard time switching in, though it's got a huge HP stat, it's defenses are piss poor. Even resisted attacks can take a toll on Darm. Flash Fire allows Arc to absorb Fire attacks and proceed to kill everything. Also, the combination of Extremespeed and Close Combat make Arc very dangerous. It means you don't have to worry as much about investing in speed and can comfortably run a +atk nature (though Darm's Flare Blitz is still stronger). On top of that, not lowering your attack everytime you use a fighting move is amazing. I don't even run Morning Sun, since I hate Chand so much, I threw Crunch on my Arc. To each his own, but Arc is not 100% outclassed by Darm.

While I'm not an avid UU player, I play enough to notice some strange things. For one, Krookodile is criminally low. With moxie and a scarf, it can nab a revenge kill then run through the opponents team late game.
Also, if you're looking for a good spinner that can also put down hazards, the Physically Defensive Kabutops in the UU Analyses has actually surprised me with it's effectiveness. It can tank a lot of physical abuse, especially the ever so common fire types. It can also lay rocks down, spin, and has useful priority in Aqua Jet. Try it out some time over Claydol and Hitmontop. Btw never use claydol, it's the definition of useless